1. Field of the Invention
This invention generally relates to air quality management and more particularly to methods and systems for monitoring and predicting emissions outputs from emission sources more accurately then the present art.
The United States Congress requires reductions in actual emissions of several hazardous air pollutants. See Clean Air Act Title IV (Acid Rain Program).sctn.7651 (West 1995 & Supp. 2000). Congress requires that any operator of an emissions source, subject to laws, must sample the emissions source and record such emissions as sulfur dioxide and nitrogen oxide emissions. The record of these emissions must be submitted to the EPA (for Environmental Protection Agency).
Sampling and reporting these emissions, however can be a slow, cumbersome, and expensive task. Emissions monitoring equipment CEMS (for continuous emission monitoring system), is an emission sensing device required by congress, can cost up to $200,000. One CEMS is often required for each source so an industrial process with multiple sources can require a million dollars or more in emission monitoring equipment. This emissions monitoring equipment also has a high installation cost and high maintenance cost. There are also long lead times and high labor costs in gathering this emissions data and in presenting the data in a format required by the EPA. Once this emission data is gathered and reported added expenses are incurred to archive thousands of pages of emissions documents and regulatory submissions. However despite all this, a CEMS is preferred over a PEMS (for predictive emission monitoring system) because of its increased accuracy.
A similar problem occurs with pollution control equipment. These units require the knowledge of the pollution levels of the pollution emitting equipment they are functioning for. Currently they use CEMS to regulate them to the optimal level for reducing pollution.
There is accordingly a need in the art for methods and systems of inexpensively monitoring source emissions, for methods and systems to inexpensively predicting source emissions, for methods and systems of gathering, formatting and reporting emission data to regulatory agencies, for assisting pollution control equipment and a system for buying and selling emission allowances. There is a need in the art to have a PEMS that does not estimate pollution levels that are being emitted when a pollution source is operating at full capacity and near its permitted level. Estimating a pollutant level at this point, even with a small degree of error, can put the emission source in violation of its permit when in fact it was in compliance.
There is accordingly a need in the art to have the PEMS accurately reflect the emission determinations that the EPA reference method tests would have derived. There is a need to have a PEMS not estimate emissions at every operating level. This invention has a PEMS not estimate emissions at certain operating levels, but instead give actual emission values derived from EPA reference method tests.
2. Description of Related Art Including Information Disclosed Under 37 CFR 1.97 and 1.98
Emission sources which could use a CEMS or PEMS have an air permit given to them by a government agency which states what is the maximum allowable emissions level it may emit. Certain air permits have written in emission levels that are greater than the highest emission level which that emission source can emit. Those emission sources can use prior art.
There are emission sources with air permits which have maximum allowable emission rates equal to or nearly equal to the emission rates that are frequently produced by the emission source. These emission sources may experience difficulty with prior art. Prior art estimates emission values. However when these emission sources were operating at its maximum emission level the prior art would sometimes estimate an emission level that was slightly higher than the actual level ascertained by an EPA reference method test. This meant a violation of a permit when in fact there was no violation.
This invention would take the actual emission level ascertained by an EPA reference method test and use that value when an emission source was operating at its maximum emission level.
Prior art estimated emission levels through an algorithm such as a neural net, or a regression analysis or a hybrid of these mathematical tools. The one common element in emission values of prior art is that every emission level produced by prior art is an estimated emission level. Prior art limited the use of PEMS to estimating emission levels at every operating level of the pollution emitting devise it was used on.
Prior art recognizes that its results will not exactly match that of an EPA reference method test. This invention's advantage is that in many of the operating levels of the source of emissions it precisely matches the actual pollutant level. It is exactly equal with no differences from the EPA reference method test.
Like prior art this PEMS has a sensor validation and like prior art it must initially go through a training process and periodically go through a retraining process.
Prior art saw the need for a PEMS as a back up to CEMS, should the CEMS malfunction. Prior art did not seek to improve the accuracy of PEMS in this combination. However a new use for PEMS is that of managing or assisting pollution control equipment. Prior art did increase the use of PEMS beyond that of just calculating emission values and did use PEMS as a device to ascertain when a CEMS was inoperable. However prior art failed to see its use in assisting a pollution control device. A CEMS senses pollution and merely reports pollution levels but a pollution control device seeks to reduce pollution levels.